Mother-child attachment dynamics in pregnancy and predictors of disruption

The “psychic womb” is essential in modulating the quality of the loving relationship between mother and child after birth. The attachment process begins long before delivery, even before conception, when the “child of dreams” is fantasized and loved. After conception, prenatal attachment can be defined as the range of behaviours, interactions and affective involvement that the mother feels and expresses towards her baby during pregnancy.
The ideal attachment dynamics are experienced when the child is desired and conceived by a loving couple in serene environmental conditions and when the pregnancy is physiologic. Disruptors of the prenatal attachment phase may impair the postnatal attachment and be associated with an increase of postnatal depression and child’ psychosomatic problems.